Prove the World Wrong!

Sermon for the Feast of Pentecost (RCL – B)
Offered by Nathan Ferrell at Church of the Holy Spirit, Bellmawr

Texts: Acts 2:1-21; Psalm 104:25-37; Romans 8:22-27; John 15:26-27 & 16:4b-15

“And when he comes, the Holy Spirit will prove the world wrong.” Amen.

My dear friends: we are all gathered together here this morning as brothers and sisters in Jesus Christ, as a community in which the Holy Spirit is moving and working.

Today, by the grace of God, we bring into this community a new member: Royal Tomeo. Of course, I will have the privilege and grace of pouring the water on his head, but remember this: it is all of us together who are baptizing Royal this day. We are baptizing Royal into the fellowship of the Church.

But remember this as well: Royal is NOT baptized today as an Episcopalian. No one ever is baptized as a Catholic, a Methodist, a Baptist, a Presbyterian or anything else! Royal will be baptized today in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. So in another sense, it is not us at all who are doing the baptizing. It is in fact the Holy Spirit who will baptize Royal, who will immerse him into the new life we have in God.

This new life that we share together in the Holy Spirit – it changes us! It changes the way we act, the way we treat others. By the power of Holy Spirit, we are able to respect the dignity of every human being, to seek and serve Christ in all persons.

Tony Campolo tells a wonderful story of a time when he was in Haiti a few years back. Tony’s ministry works to promote good education for poor children in places like Haiti and the Dominican Republic, as well as places here like Camden. But once when Tony was in Port-au-Prince for a visit to check-up on the work there, as he was walking into the Holiday Inn hotel, three young girls intercepted him. They were probably about 15 years old. The one in the middle said to him, “Mister, for ten dollars you can have me all night long.”

Tony was shocked. He was aware of the extreme poverty in Haiti and what desperation that kind of poverty leads people to, but he wasn’t expecting this from girls so young. So he looked at the other two girls and asked them, “Can I have you each for ten dollars too?” They nodded yes, trying to hide their disgust for the bald, middle-aged American man. Quickly hatching a plan, Tony said, “Fine! I’ve got thirty dollars right here. I’m in Room 210. You be up there in half an hour. I’ll pay you then and I want all three of you for the whole night.”

As soon as he got up to his room, he called down to the concierge: “Send up every Disney movie you’ve got. If it’s made by Disney, send it up.” This was before the days when you could order a movie right on the TV. And then Tony called the hotel restaurant: “Do you make banana splits? Good! I want extra full banana splits, with extra fudge and extra whipped cream. And … I want four of them! Right away.” Pretty soon, the movies and the ice cream and the girls all arrived. And Tony sat them down on the bed and let them pick out movies that they would like to see. And they all ate ice cream and watched movies until 1 o’clock in the morning or so, when the girls all fell asleep.

And as Tony fell asleep on the chair in the corner of the room, he thought with disgust about how dirty men could abuse young girls like this, and how in the morning they will go back to the street and once again do whatever they can to find some money for their families. But at least for this one night, Tony felt sure that the Holy Spirit was speaking to him and guiding him to give these girls at least a chance to be kids again, to just have some fun together. At least for this one night, Tony could be a conduit for some blessing to these poor girls.

You see, the Holy Spirit proves the world wrong. There is a different way to be. We can treat others with dignity. By the power of the Spirit, we can love others with the love of Christ. It is our calling, and it is our gift, to love others in this way.

The famous Christian philosopher, Soren Kierkegaard (see his Works of Love) points out the distinction between celebrated love and commanded love. Celebrated love is the love about which people write poems, about which movies are made. Celebrated love is all about making a distinction: I love this one person more than any other. With this love, the lover makes a clear choice.

But commanded love, the love to which Christ calls us, the love which the Holy Spirit pours into our hearts, - this love makes no distinctions. This is the beauty and majesty of it.

You see, God intends that I learn to see every single woman as my sister, and every single man as my brother. Every single one, without exception. This is the love that God calls us to in Christ. But it’s not the kind of love that we are accustomed to talking about in society. No one sings a song about this kind of love! But when it comes down to it, it is this Holy Spirit-empowered, commanded love which has the power to change the world.

Let’s practice it for just a moment: please take a moment and look at your neighbor on each side of you in the eye and say to them, as is appropriate, “You are my sister.” Or, “you are my brother.”

The Spirit leads us into all truth, and this is the truth about us.
It doesn’t matter what your neighbor looks like, what language they speak, who they live with, where they come from. It doesn’t even matter what they have done in their lives. This new community love in the Spirit has no boundaries. This is the way God intended it to be.

Our Lord Jesus Christ has always had the intention of creating a community that includes people of every language and race and color and gender and orientation.

This is the heart of what it means to be “church”. We don’t get to choose our family in the church. God brings all together and makes something new and different.

This agape love that we share in Christian community is demonstrated clearly every time we gather to celebrate the Eucharist. This is what St. John Chrysostom wrote:
“The whole ceremony [of the Lord’s table] is [also] a meal at which everyone has an equal place at the table. Thus we are celebrating our fellowship as brothers and sisters, with Christ as our unseen elder brother at one end of the table, and God our unseen father presiding at the other end” (On Living Simply: The Golden Voice of John Chrysostom).

Our Lord speaks of the Spirit of Truth who comes to guide us into the truth about life, and who comes to prove the world wrong. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and is sent by the Son into community gathered in the name of Jesus. Nowhere in the New Testament do we see the Holy Spirit filling a lone individual; the coming of the Spirit always happens in the community of Christ’s body. “Where two or three are gathered together in my name…(Matthew 18:20).

I really love this image of the Spirit: “he will prove the world wrong about sin and righteousness and judgment.” I love it, because every day I see a world that needs an awakening. Come on, Holy Spirit, let’s prove this crazy world wrong! Let’s prove this world wrong that “looking out for #1” is the only way to live, that “getting what is mine” is the way you have to be. Let’s prove the world wrong and show that there is an alternative, that Jesus creates a different kind of community where everyone is respected and honored and loved.

It is possible! We are the assembly of the Holy Spirit. When we gather together as God’s people, we create a free space where the words of Jesus, and the gifts of Jesus, are able to re-create the world, to make the world new again, to make us new again.

This is the work of the Holy Spirit. This is the mystery that we enter into today as we celebrate the baptism of our newest brother into this community of love which is unlike any other.

As the great St. John Chrysostom preached: “Nothing can destroy love which is rooted and grounded in Christ.” So may the Holy Spirit always bring forth this love among us. Amen.